it wasnt really a fighter that caught my attention into mma but rather a fight. i remember watching the matt hughes vs frank trigg 2 fight and how matt hughes got hit in the groin and came back from almost being choked out to winning the fight.

I was pulled in by the Arlovski hype. I remember seeing a commercial where they go on about how he's invincible. That coupled with his wild man look he was rockin back before he went all metro. I thought the guy was scary
And then he lost to Tim Sylvia.....

It wasn't really a single fight or fighter for me. I've always been vaguely interested, but what really got me hooked was when I discovered Pride on FSN. I couldn't believe how exciting and brutal the fights seemed compared to what I had seen previously. Granted it was basically a "best of" show, but that's what got me hooked on the sport.

I first saw Shamrock referee at WM13 in 1997. After that I checked out old UFC tapes to find out just why he was called the world's most dangerous man. After watching a cou0ple of tapes Gracie quickly became my favorite fighter, but with the exception of Gracie and a few others the talent seemed to be severely lacking. In fact in some ways it was a let down. I mean here you have these so called world class martial artists fighting in a way comparable to school children on the playground. So after watching a few events on VHS I forgot about it.

Years later I happened to be channel surfing and stumlbed on the Ultimate Fighter Finale. It's possible I only stopped to watch because I saw Shamrock's familiar face, but I don't remember. Anyway impressed by the event I downloaded lots of older events. Some of which I had seen before and others which were completely new to me.

So I was first attracted to MMA by Shamrock, but I did not become a fan until I had seen how the sport had evolved years later during the TUF finale.

Ken Shamrock. I didn't really follow any MMA until he came back to fight Tito. I remembered him from wrestling so I decided to check it out. It was disappointing to see him get beat, but I take solace in the fact that he was no longer in prime.

Chuck Liddell as much as it pains to me say lol. But I wouldn't really say it was really any one fighter. I had started a new job in 06 in may and I met my current best friend (yeah mooshy gay stuff lol) and when august? came around I dunno why we just ordered a ppv . It was the Liddell/Babalu ppv and I guess he was a Iceman fan. We've been ordering and watching every ppv together since.

I didn't really start watching MMA fighting until after the Ultimate Fighter debuted. But hell, before that I never really had the means to watch PPV events. I had crappy assed cable with a bunch of suck channels. (but me being a gamer and all, I didn't really give a crap)

Of course I had heard of the Ultimate Fighting Championship for many years before that. It always saddened me that I couldn't watch any of 'em.

I remember watching Royce dominate in the UFC when I was little...then years later when I found out there was a school with the last name "Gracie" in it by my house, I decided to check it out. I ended up joining and did JJ up until last year there on a regular basis.

I was always interested in the sport (never had real access to it until I got free satellite though), but if there was one fighter that really pulled me in, it was Arlovski when he seemed almost invincible. He was an amazing striker.

Cro Cop probably and similiar fighters of his ilk, as I watched more standard kickboxing for a long while before MMA. I wasnt really into the early days of MMA - just seemed too primitive back then in comparison to boxing which i've always been a massive follower but as the standard's rapidly improved I couldnt help but be drawn into it.